Every few years I do a survey of you guys so I can have a better sense of my blog’s readership. For that purpose, below I’ve got two polls to ask you (1) about your general backgrounds and (2) preferences about post content.

Because some people may want to vote more than once on the types of posts they like the most, I’ve allowed re-voting on that poll.

Free stuff? Those who participate and leave a comment or email me to indicate they did (knoepflerATucdavisDOTedu) will be entered in a drawing for one bundle of free swag: a stem cell t-shirt and signed copies of my two books.

I appreciate your insight into the industry, especially education and awareness on the unproven stem cell clinics out there. It would be great to see even more updates on the clinical trial progress of both cord blood and various MSC from reputable sources (Duke, MD Anderson, etc). Keep up the good work.

I am extremely interested in this and other technology hot topics because I see things progressing very rapidly. At this point I’m really just watching for the big news items. “One step closer” type stuff. The thing I’ve sadly, more or less, given up on is trying to understand is what needs to occur for scientists to achieve the great things these technologies promise. Shedding light on this would truly excite me. I’m less interested in the politics though I appreciate the relevance of that. Let me put it this way, as an average citizen, despite my support and strong interest, I still feel like many others in that I can’t be sure I should believe people like Aubrey De Grey when he says “given the funding we’d be done in a year or two.” I desperately want to understand more about what the technical problems are that need to be overcome in order to apply the science and what scientists have tried, are trying, and what they predict might resolve the issues satisfactorily.

Difficult to choose a favorite kind of post. I chose Opinion pieces because, in addition to the information itself, these posts produce the most activity in the comments. In fact, sometimes I log in just to read the comments! (and Kudos for managing this part of the blog so well)